Pre-Crisis Primer: Enter John Constantine

Swamp Thing 37

“Growth Patterns”

Swamp Thing goes hippie in The Green.

C'mon, you didn't really think Swamp Thing was dead, did you? Of course not, you're a canny reader and have experienced enough stories to know that as far as fiction is concerned, death is merely one more hurdle to be overcome. In comic books, its basically a revolving door.

The Thing's gamble regarding leaving his current body, which had been completely wrecked by a radioactive hobo (with comics it's fun to make plot points sound sillier than they are by over-simplifying), and trying to plant (ho ho) himself somewhere else pays of in dividends. He also meets a new friend along the way. 

Constantine and the dapper company he keeps.

The aforementioned dividends first pay out in a new means of transportation and the realization that Swamp Thing is not a being confined to a body but a conscious who can interact with something called 'The Green' which is a sort of other plane of existence accessible by plant life. Not quite a hive mind, but more like a meditative space where communication is not verbal, nor even limited to language, but along the lines of instant understanding. All in all, kind of a cool thing and definitely a new aspect of Swamp Thing's life that will be explored and fleshed out in following stories. The transportation is more like teleportation: Swamp Thing can abandon a body at any one point on the planet, travel through he green to the new destination and grow a completely new body from the local vegetation.

While Swamp Thing struggles with growing a new body in this issue, it's pretty much the crux of the story and plot, with subsequent uses of this new power he will be able to regenerate himself almost instantaneously. 

Not a dream, not a hoax, it's baby Swamp Thing!

While Swamp Thing is regrowing himself under the care of always helpful Abby Arcane (she sprays his tiny, plantling self with pesticides), the real importance with this story is the introduction of John Constantine. Constantine is more popularly known as the star of the comic book 'Hellblazer' and less spectacularly as the basis for Keanu Reeves' character in the dismal film 'Constantine'

Constantine is a favorite character and I'll inform readers right now: I am going to be covering the entirety of the Hellblazer series through the Post-Crisis. While the title eventually severed all connection to the mainstream superhero DC Universe, it did start there. Plus a little bit of dark crime and adventure will be a nice break from the constant colorful super heroics. Regardless of any of that information, who is John Constantine? At this point, it's sufficient to say that the man is a magician and a self-described 'nasty piece of work.' His magic is of the subtle variety: knowing things, knowing what things should not be, knowing how to stop said things and, most importantly, knowing how to get other people to do his dirty work for him. Eventually the guilt of Constantine's sacrifices will catch up to him, but right now it's not his goddamn problem.

Not a friend you want to have around.

It's Swamp Thing's goddamn problem because our boy Constantine has promised him answers to what he really is (we know he's not a man, not a tulip) and what The Green is all about. In order to gain these answers, Swamp Thing is going to have to go on a little trip across America battling various pockets of supernatural activity. Said supernatural activity all a precursor to the coming of some ancient evil. Basically the plot of Ghostbusters. But it's cool. Time for a road trip.

Going road-trippin'

As all this is going underway we do catch a glimpse of an avatar of this evil, a twisted men with one arm bent behind him, the hand sewn into his spine and his head completely turned around. An evil who takes great joy in pushing one of Constantine friends out a window. So it begins.

If only he could scratch that itch....